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Comedians meet to plot action over Just For Laughs radio takeover

Sorry, if that’s not funny, but that was also the mood at a standup comics’ town hall held at the Comedy Bar on Tuesday evening, organized by the Canadian Association of Standup Comedians (CASC) — and there were some jokes cracked, but definitely in the vein of gallows humour.

The meeting was organized to try and come up with the next steps in the current dispute involving Just for Laughs takeover of Canada Laughs, a SiriusXM satellite radio station that had been playing independent comedians’ comedy albums and paying royalties that had become a financial lifeline for many of them. JFL is now in control of the station, and has replaced much of the (previously all-Canadian) content with work from their library of archived comedy. Many comedians are upset at what they perceive as the latest slight from that organization that reaps funding from Canadian levels of government — reportedly about $4 million last year — but international (mostly American) headliners get the plum gigs at its Montreal festival.

“People are distraught. Look, I’m not delusional and people have a right in a capitalist society to take away anything at any time. But with this situation, I liken it to losing your job without notice,” says Sandra Battaglini, the founder of CASC, comparing it to news of General Motors shutting down Oshawa operations. “When this news came out and people started looking at the plays of their albums, and saw they had been stopped, everyone panicked, because they are not going to be able to pay their rent. They’re not going to be able to pay their bills.”

The CRTC, comics were told, has to approve the Canada Laughs-JFL licence renewal in April, and the hopes of trying to come up some sort of amicable end to the dispute. That often contrasted with angry and upset comedians, who wanted to take more of a direct action, with talk of potential JFL boycotts and protests, including potentially targeting an April 11 Casino Rama show by Howie Mandel.

Mandel is one of the owners of JFL, along with Los Angeles-based talent and literary agency ICM Partners and Bell Media, who took a stake in it last year, after the fest’s founder was ousted due to harassment allegations. Mandel, in particular, has raised the ire of comedians by going on Facebook Live to dispute some of “misinformation” about the takeover; his stated desire to promote Canadian comedy and comedians rang hollow in the packed Comedy Bar.

Though no path of action was agreed upon on Tuesday, Battaglini suggested this moment could be a “breaking point” to something positive happening for comedians. The story is getting media attention (not all of it helpful to CASC: a CBC TV reporter doing live reporting from Comedy Bar had it disrupted by a comedian apparently licking the reporter’s ear on the air). This exposure could help with other issues, like a cause she took up last year: getting comedy to be recognized as a performing art in Canada, which could provide access to more grants and funding bodies.

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She believes the social-media pressure from comedians speaking out — as well as solidarity from big-name Americans — is helping the situation and JFL’s government funding is possible leverage.

“When the public finds out that comedians are losing income and the fact that JFL and Sirius — especially JFL — rely on government grants and uses those government grants to prioritize American talent and content over us, that’s what freaks people out,” explains Battaglini. “ ‘Oh, my tax dollars are going to do that?’ That’s why people are upset.”

Efforts to reach Mandel were not responded to by deadline, but JFL sent an email stating that “We understand and hear the concerns raised by the Canadian comedy community regarding the new JFL Radio comedy channel on SiriusXM Canada. JFL and SiriusXM Canada respect and appreciate their point of view, and continue the dialogue with CASC.”

JFL says that SiriusXM, which owns the channel, wanted to expand its audience and approached JFL for a partnership. JFL added that the playlist for the renamed JFL Radio channel would remain “majority Canadian” and that to open up hours of airtime, Sirius XM removed more than a quarter of their original talk programming to open up air time for comedy clips. The email also stated Sirius XM has no obligation to keep a comedy channel under CRTC rules.

Direct action and boycotts of various JFL events around the country left some comedians feeling torn. Pete Johansson has performed at many JFL showcases in the past, and he feels that organization has lost its way, and believes that direct action needs to be taken, along with CASC’s more political approach.

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“JFL is a strong economic system — foreign-owned, U.S.-profiting corporate system — and we are the people that need to throw some pressure on them,” says Johansson. “I don’t want JFL to be our enemy, I want JFL to come back where they were at the beginning, and be a partner to celebrating Canadian comics.”

Michelle Shaughnessy is another comedian who is thinking about boycotting JFL events, but admits it is difficult. “I’ve wanted to do that festival for so long. It’s something growing up as comics, it’s one of all or our goals. But it’s not just for me, it’s for every comic coming up after us, so it’s time for somebody to take a stand and say, this isn’t right.”

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